Modeling truck-shovel systems as closed queueing network with multiple job classes

In this paper an analytical method is proposed to model the truck-shovel system as a closed queueing network with multiple job classes. This approach would provide the capability of estimating system performance measures (mine throughput, mean number of trucks, mean waiting time etc.) for planning purposes when the truck fleet is not necessarily composed of identical trucks. A computational study is presented to show how choosing different types of trucks affect the production level in a truck-shovel system. Mean Value Analysis approach can be used to compute all performance measures of the truck-shovel system.